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Tintin - Tintin in America

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It's 1931 and having dealt with Al Capone's diamond smuggling operation in the Belgian Congo Tintin and Snowy head for Chicago to clean up Gangsterland. He almost at once runs afoul of Al Capone himselfnote Capone is the only real person to appear in the Tintin stories but manages to evade the mob boss only to find himself making an enemy of Capone's rival Bobby Smiles.

Smiles repeatedly tries to have Tintin killed but after the young reporter turns the tables on him Smiles flees Chicago for Redskin City and Tintin spends most of the rest of the adventure trying to bring him to justice. He returns to Chicago in time for a showdown with the rest of the mobsters.

For many years Tintin in America was the earliest adventure available in English and it shows. Aside from Tintin and Snowy there are no other familiar characters, the plot (and research) is near non-existant, and Snowy still talks (admittedly only on one page).

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Tropes:

Adapted Out: The Native American storyline doesn't appear in the Ellipse-Nelvana animated adaptation.

Americans Are Cowboys: Once Tintin leaves Chicago and its mobsters, pretty much every American he encounters in the countryside is a cowboy or some other kind of frontiersman. Somewhat justified, as the cowboy era was not long dead. The trope is Played With in the same book, however: A Boom Town is built overnight in an area that used to be pretty Wild West. The next morning, Tintin finds himself the only person in the city still wearing his cowboy outfit, and receives a chiding from a police officer who tells him to put on something proper.

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Big-Bad Ensemble: Bobby Smiles is the principal villain of the story, but Al Capone is actually the first gangster who Tintin runs up against, and a separate gang tries to go after Tintin in the closing sections, after Smiles has been caught.

Boom Town: The discovery of oil in a piece of Injun Country leads to its overnight conversion into a bustling small city (the Indians are forced to leave within an hour by the army at bayonet-point). The next morning, Tintin finds himself the only person in the city still wearing his cowboy outfit, and receives a chiding from a police officer who tells him to put on something proper.

Brandishment Bluff: When two gangsters are seeing if they've actually killed him after throwing a dummy in the lake:

Tintin:"Hands Up! Put your guns down and slide them behind you"

(Gangsters comply. Tintin collects guns.)

Tintin:"Much obliged, seeing as I didn't have one of my own."

But Not Too Black: When Tintin finally got marketed in the USA in the 1950s he was forced to change a few black extras into white people. For instance: the man guarding the hotel after the Native Americans are being removed from their land was originally black, as were the woman and her crying baby, whom Tintin incorrectly assumes is Snowy crying for help.

Cassandra Truth: The police officer thinks Tintin is taking him for a ride when the latter tells he captured Al Capone.

Climb, Slip, Hang, Climb: The Ellipse-Nelvana animated version adds this to a ledge-walking scene that had averted it in the book. Made more egregious by Tintin outright pulling himself up using only his arms to climb back on the platform.

Deadly Dodging: Of the accidental kind. One goon picks up a vase to throw at Tintin who stands by the door. Then Al Capone comes through the door and receives the vase in his face.

Deus ex Machina: Arguably uses this more than any other entry in the series. Smiles' mooks using knockout gas instead of poison gas by mistake, the animal lover stopping the train, Tintin and Snowy being tossed off a cliff and landing on a branch conveniently next to a cave network, the woman stopping the train, the cannery workers going on strike, Tintin mistakenly being tied to a set of wooden weights rather than real ones.

Dog Pile of Doom: Tintin is falsely accused of being a bandit, and a group of yokels try to lynch him. After failing to do so repeatedly, they all descend on him in a dogpile, each wanting to be the next one to try. Tintin escapes by crawling out from underneath.

Historical-Domain Character: Al Capone, who was still alive at the time this story was drawn. For obvious reasons Hergé had to let him escape. In Harry Thompson's "Tintin and Hergé: a double biography" Thompson wrote down a funny quote about this cameo: "We don't know what Al Capone ever thought of the album. He probably never read it, seeing that Hergé was never found on the bottom of a Belgian river with his feet in a block of cement."

I Have Your Wife: Snowy is kidnapped by gangsters, and Tintin has to rescue him.

Inexplicably Identical Individuals: The horses appearing in the story have pretty strange postures. And if you compare carefully, they all have just two or three different outlines.

Injun Country: A rather mixed example — the Blackfeet Indians are violent and gullible but they are also depicted as victims.

In Medias Res: Because Tintin in the Congo was not available for so long but this story was, it came across as this. Al Capone referring to his previous clash with Tintin sounded more like a Cryptic Background Reference to readers than referring back to an actual written previous story.

Karma Houdini: Al Capone, assuming he had not been arrested offscreen. In Real Life, Capone was tried and arrested for tax evasion while this story was still being serialised, so one can presume his fictional counterpart eventually followed suit. Averted in the Animated Adaptation, where he's arrested alongside the other gangsters (due to the real Capone being long dead at that point).

Knight's Armor Hideout: Tintin sneaks into the castle where the members of the KIDNAP Inc. meet. He hides inside a knight's armor in the corridor and takes out one unsuspecting baddie after the other as they pass by.

Knockout Gas: The Gangsters Syndicate of Chicago uses knockout gas on Tintin after dropping him through a Trap Door and before dumping him into Lake Michigan. Fortunately for Tintin, they used the wrong kind of gas.

Mob War: Played with; the mobs are initially battling each other, but near the end of the story most of them call a truce in an effort to get rid of Tintin once and for all.

Mystery Meat: Grynde Corp. make their tinned meat out of dogs, cats, rats and nearly Tintin, until he escaped.

National Stereotypes: The USA is depicted as a country full of gangsters, skyscrapers and cowboys and Native Americans who apparently still roam the Wild West. When Tintin strikes oil countless American business people quickly appear out of nowhere to buy the ground from him (offering sums in tens of thousands). After being informed that it actually belongs to the Native Americans the business people quickly pay them a paltry $25, force them to leave immediately and build an entire city from scratch in a matter of 24 hours!

Or My Name Isn't...: This line is used twice by hostile people. The French version was "As true as my name is X, I'll [get him]!"

Random Events Plot: Not to the same extent as Land of the Soviets or Tintin in the Congo, as about half of the storyline is focused on Tintin's attempt to take down Bobby Smiles, but it still doesn't really have a coherent overall storyline, instead just being based around the general theme of Tintin battling gangsters.

Runaway Train: The brake lever is broken on the train so it runs head on into a boulder on the tracks.

The Savage Indian: The book features somewhat unfortunate depictions of a plains tribe as rather primitive and hostile towards outsiders.

Saved by the Platform Below: Tintin falls off a cliff while pursued by angry natives, but is saved by a small tree with a ledge right below... and that ledge has an entrance to a secret cave.

Senseless Violins: There is a single panel showing one of the gangsters with his gun inside a violin.

Sherlock Scan: Tintin hires a private detective after his beloved dog Snowy goes missing. The detective examines the scene and quickly produces a detailed scenario of the dog-napping. Tintin wonders if this man is a Sherlock or a charlatan  it's unfortunately the latter as he repeatedly turns up with every kind of dog except Snowy.

Shout-Out: The original 1931 story had a shout-out to Mary Pickford near the end, when Tintin is speeching to a bunch of rich people. This was removed from the color version.

Spinning Clock Hands: One panel shows the clock at different times while Tintin is running in circles waiting for the dog detective to return with Snowy.

Suspiciously Similar Substitute: The ending of Tintin in the Congo teased a battle between Tintin and Al Capone, and the early stages of the story seem to be setting him up as the main villain, but he ends up disappearing quite early on, with Bobby Smiles subsequently taking over as the main villain. It's thought that Hergé actually did intend to have Capone as the main villain throughout the story, but for whatever reason — either due to the possibility that one of the then-ongoing investigations into Capone would actually lead to his being jailed, which would pose a problem given the serialised nature of the story, or the off-chance that Capone had some Belgian friends who he might send to teach Hergé a lesson — wrote him out and replaced him with Smiles.

Translation Convention: Done in a weird way in the French version. While the American characters appear to be speaking French, they begin their sentences with English phrases such as "How do you do" and "Good morning" to remind the readers that they are really speaking English. Most other books have everyone speak French even in situations where English or Spanish would be more appropriate.

Trap Door: Bobby Smiles presses a button with his foot to make Tintin fall through the floor and into a room with some Knockout Gas.

What Happened to the Mouse?: The comic starts with Tintin searching for Al Capone. After a short confrontation, Al is never seen again, and the story switches to having Bobby Smiles as the main villain.

When Elders Attack: An older lady punches the dog detective with her umbrella because he stole her Fritzy.

The Wild West: Apparently coexisting with 1930s Chicago. That being said, the redrawn version at least indicates that Tintin needs a two-day train journey to get there, whereas the original edition had it practically on Chicago's doorstep.

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